core i7-4770k

Intel has marketed its Core i7-4790K as an enthusiast, overclocking-oriented processor — but does it stand up to the hype? We put the core through its paces at a variety of clock frequencies and voltages.

At CES 2014, Valve unveiled 14 new Steam Machines that will (probably) be released in 2014. These machines, produced by over a dozen manufacturers, span the gamut when it comes to hardware specs — from the beastly Origin PC Chronos with two Nvidia GTX Titans, all the way down to some console-like boxes priced at $500, with mid-range CPUs and graphics cards. With so many price points and hardware variations, it’s fairly hard to work out which Steam Machine gives you the best bang for the buck. Fortunately, the folks over at Futuremark have got us covered.

Intel’s new Ivy Bridge-E is out and available, but it’s not the chip a lot of enthusiasts were hoping for. With just six cores, and minimal clock speed increases, Intel clearly isn’t prioritizing enthusiasts anymore.

With each successive microarchitecture release from Intel since I built my Nehalem-based PC at the beginning of 2010, I kept asking myself, “is it time to upgrade?” Sandy Bridge was nice, but it wasn’t worth upgrading for a paltry 15% performance boost. Likewise, another 10% from Ivy Bridge just wasn’t enough. I had already decided…